1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:06,860 ANNOUNCER: This is the Washington Week Webcast Extra. 2 00:00:06,860 --> 00:00:09,100 JOHN HARWOOD: Hello, and welcome. 3 00:00:09,100 --> 00:00:11,200 I'm John Harwood, filling in for Gwen Ifill. 4 00:00:11,200 --> 00:00:15,210 Joining me around the table, Juliet Eilperin of The Washington Post, Michael Scherer of 5 00:00:15,210 --> 00:00:20,010 Time Magazine, Manu Raju of Politico, and Nancy Youssef of The Daily Beast. 6 00:00:20,010 --> 00:00:25,210 Nancy, let's start with your exclusive story about the wife of an ISIS leader who is 7 00:00:25,210 --> 00:00:29,490 being held in U.S. custody. Why is she being held? And what's going to happen to her? 8 00:00:29,490 --> 00:00:31,330 NANCY YOUSSEF: Well, she's an interesting case. 9 00:00:31,330 --> 00:00:35,950 She has a nom de jure, Umm Sayyaf, and she was captured with her - when her husband was 10 00:00:35,950 --> 00:00:38,690 killed about a month ago in what was really celebrated by the U.S. 11 00:00:38,690 --> 00:00:42,110 military as a treasure trove of intelligence and everything else. 12 00:00:42,110 --> 00:00:45,240 It's a unique case because, remember, they've been fighting this war primarily from the 13 00:00:45,240 --> 00:00:49,970 air, through airstrikes, and so the whole idea in doing that in part was that they would 14 00:00:49,970 --> 00:00:53,150 not confront captives and what to do with them and whatnot. 15 00:00:53,150 --> 00:00:59,610 Now the argument that they're holding her on is that she was an ISIS operative, that she 16 00:00:59,610 --> 00:01:02,850 was not just the wife of one of the top ISIS officials but someone who knew things about, 17 00:01:02,850 --> 00:01:07,060 for example, Western hostages who was taken and overall ISIS operations. 18 00:01:07,060 --> 00:01:09,670 And so she is being held in Iraq and the U.S. 19 00:01:09,670 --> 00:01:13,800 has determined that they have the legal grounds to hold her, but it's opened a whole list 20 00:01:13,800 --> 00:01:16,470 of questions about what happens in future cases. 21 00:01:16,470 --> 00:01:18,970 Can you apply her case to other cases? 22 00:01:18,970 --> 00:01:21,840 Are there going to be new legal groundworks that need to be set? 23 00:01:21,840 --> 00:01:25,610 And it really brings the Obama administration right back to where it didn't want to be: 24 00:01:25,610 --> 00:01:29,920 at the end of the Bush administration of having to deal with terrorist detainees, what to 25 00:01:29,920 --> 00:01:33,060 do with them, what are the options once they've been interrogated. 26 00:01:33,060 --> 00:01:35,260 JOHN HARWOOD: Fascinating. Thanks, Nancy. 27 00:01:35,260 --> 00:01:41,590 Juliet, you cover the White House, which had a quite extraordinary moment this week 28 00:01:41,590 --> 00:01:47,470 when, mid-briefing, they sounded an evacuation order of the Briefing Room. 29 00:01:47,470 --> 00:01:52,340 Now, I will say - I actually tweeted this - I'm not sure that the evacuation of the room 30 00:01:52,340 --> 00:01:56,270 affected the amount of actual news that would - was conveyed in the briefing - (laughter) - 31 00:01:56,270 --> 00:01:57,610 JULIET EILPERIN: Right. 32 00:01:57,610 --> 00:02:00,780 JOHN HARWOOD: - but it was still an extraordinary thing to see. What happened? 33 00:02:00,780 --> 00:02:04,180 JULIET EILPERIN: Basically, a couple of Secret Service agents came into the briefing. 34 00:02:04,180 --> 00:02:07,650 They looked a little nervously over at Josh Earnest, the press secretary, who was in the 35 00:02:07,650 --> 00:02:12,160 middle of answering a question about the data breach of personnel records. 36 00:02:12,160 --> 00:02:17,430 And they said that there's been a threat and we needed to evacuate, and we dutifully got 37 00:02:17,430 --> 00:02:21,200 up and got out of there and walked across the street. 38 00:02:21,200 --> 00:02:23,000 JOHN HARWOOD: Was anybody scared? 39 00:02:23,000 --> 00:02:26,840 JULIET EILPERIN: People were not scared, and part of it was - I have to say, one of the 40 00:02:26,840 --> 00:02:31,370 funniest moments is that all the press folks got up and then they just went back into the 41 00:02:31,370 --> 00:02:33,750 press offices within the White House. 42 00:02:33,750 --> 00:02:37,680 So we felt like it couldn't be that seriously - serious if they were not immediately 43 00:02:37,680 --> 00:02:40,850 exiting with us. So that kind of made us feel better about it. 44 00:02:40,850 --> 00:02:45,190 But it was this conundrum that we felt like this was perhaps the one time it seemed that 45 00:02:45,190 --> 00:02:49,660 the Secret Service was taking the security of journalists more seriously than the 46 00:02:49,660 --> 00:02:51,600 president of the United States, so - 47 00:02:51,600 --> 00:02:55,500 JOHN HARWOOD: And the idea that I read about that the cameras, the television cameras, 48 00:02:55,500 --> 00:03:00,410 were covered or tilted while reporters were out, what was the reason for that? 49 00:03:00,410 --> 00:03:04,750 JULIET EILPERIN: They never provided an explanation, although one assumes it was so 50 00:03:04,750 --> 00:03:08,610 that we would not be able to record what happened in terms of the security sweep. 51 00:03:08,610 --> 00:03:12,280 But we were pleased that at least they used the Washington Post Sports Section to block 52 00:03:12,280 --> 00:03:14,560 out one of ABC's cameras. 53 00:03:14,560 --> 00:03:17,630 (Laughter.) So that at least made us feel like there's a use for the newspaper. 54 00:03:17,630 --> 00:03:20,500 JOHN HARWOOD: Very nice. MICHAEL SCHERER: Print's not dead. (Laughter.) 55 00:03:20,500 --> 00:03:24,100 JOHN HARWOOD: Michael, I want to talk about Rand Paul and some of the fallout from what 56 00:03:24,100 --> 00:03:28,940 he did on the surveillance issue, where he allowed those authorities to expire. 57 00:03:28,940 --> 00:03:33,940 And you've got now the potential for the conservative Bush/Cheney foreign policy 58 00:03:33,940 --> 00:03:40,780 apparatus to come back at him hard because that's their surveillance regime which he was 59 00:03:40,780 --> 00:03:43,590 targeting. What can he expect? 60 00:03:43,590 --> 00:03:45,920 MICHAEL SCHERER: Well, you know, a couple years ago when he had that filibuster over 61 00:03:45,920 --> 00:03:49,560 drones, it seemed like the party was shifting, that there was this big titanic movement 62 00:03:49,560 --> 00:03:52,790 happening and he was clearly rising. 63 00:03:52,790 --> 00:03:57,660 And he had tried to prepare himself for this moment by since then sort of moderating 64 00:03:57,660 --> 00:04:01,860 some of his foreign policy views. He's now in favor of fighting ISIS, for instance. 65 00:04:01,860 --> 00:04:07,180 He's fighting the claim of "isolationist." But it became apparent a couple weeks ago 66 00:04:07,180 --> 00:04:11,650 now that the party has not moved, and I think a lot of it has to do with ISIS. 67 00:04:11,650 --> 00:04:18,120 And when he stood up and did, you know, very bravely, courageously in his way, stop the 68 00:04:18,120 --> 00:04:23,260 Senate in its tracks, force McConnell to take a bill on the NSA that he didn't want to 69 00:04:23,260 --> 00:04:27,590 take, no one on the Republican field stood up with him. 70 00:04:27,590 --> 00:04:31,970 And on top of that, clearly several people on the Republican side are just raring for 71 00:04:31,970 --> 00:04:34,540 the fight. They can't wait to come after him. 72 00:04:34,540 --> 00:04:37,930 And it - and it puts him where he didn't want to be at this point. 73 00:04:37,930 --> 00:04:41,980 He wanted to be this expansionist candidate who's going to break out of his father's 74 00:04:41,980 --> 00:04:46,710 box, and it very much looks like at this point in the race that the box is being rebuilt 75 00:04:46,710 --> 00:04:50,350 around him. JOHN HARWOOD: Does not feel like that's happening, you're right. 76 00:04:50,350 --> 00:04:57,730 Manu, Ted Cruz has been famous for his all-out, over-the-edge-of-the-cliff fights 77 00:04:57,730 --> 00:04:59,990 against Obamacare. 78 00:04:59,990 --> 00:05:05,290 Now Republicans have the prospect, if the Court rules against the president, of, to 79 00:05:05,290 --> 00:05:12,840 avoid flack being directed to them, passing some sort of alternative plan, fix, extension 80 00:05:12,840 --> 00:05:16,140 of subsidies. He says he's going to fight. What are the implications of that? 81 00:05:16,140 --> 00:05:18,740 MANU RAJU: It's pretty significant. It really shows the divide within the 82 00:05:18,740 --> 00:05:22,420 Republican Party right now and the challenges of Congress responding in case 83 00:05:22,420 --> 00:05:26,690 they do lose - the administration does lose this court case. 84 00:05:26,690 --> 00:05:31,130 What Ted Cruz told me is that he's going to oppose all Republican plans 85 00:05:31,130 --> 00:05:34,570 to extend subsidies for 18 months. 86 00:05:34,570 --> 00:05:37,200 This is a leading proposal right now in the Senate. 87 00:05:37,200 --> 00:05:40,420 What they would do is that they would extend those subsidies for the millions of people 88 00:05:40,420 --> 00:05:44,840 who would lose them for 18 months, but at a cost: they want to also force the 89 00:05:44,840 --> 00:05:51,420 administration to kill the employer mandate, the individual mandate, pretty - the central 90 00:05:51,420 --> 00:05:56,710 core of Obamacare. They want that in exchange for temporarily extending the subsidies. 91 00:05:56,710 --> 00:05:59,390 But that is not even enough for Ted Cruz. 92 00:05:59,390 --> 00:06:03,090 He wants to fight even that because he doesn't think that the subsidies should be 93 00:06:03,090 --> 00:06:08,160 extended. He said at the very least states should be allowed to opt out of Obamacare. 94 00:06:08,160 --> 00:06:10,360 That seems to be his bottom-line demand. 95 00:06:10,360 --> 00:06:12,930 JOHN HARWOOD: And how do other Republicans feel about this idea of his? 96 00:06:12,930 --> 00:06:15,370 MANU RAJU: They're divided. They're all over the map. 97 00:06:15,370 --> 00:06:19,880 I mean, you're seeing a lot of House Republicans align with Ted Cruz on this and not 98 00:06:19,880 --> 00:06:23,050 really like what the Senate Republicans are proposing. 99 00:06:23,050 --> 00:06:26,310 And then you have Senate Republicans saying, look, we got to do something because the 100 00:06:26,310 --> 00:06:29,580 system is going to be in chaos and we're going to take a brunt of the blame if people 101 00:06:29,580 --> 00:06:32,660 suddenly see their health care coverage skyrocket. 102 00:06:32,660 --> 00:06:37,750 It just really shows that if there is a(n) administration loss, the Republicans are 103 00:06:37,750 --> 00:06:42,060 still struggling with a plan to replace Obamacare. 104 00:06:42,060 --> 00:06:45,430 They're been saying repeal and replace for so many years; they still don't have a plan 105 00:06:45,430 --> 00:06:48,570 to replace. And they may soon have to come up with one. 106 00:06:48,570 --> 00:06:52,410 JOHN HARWOOD: Little bit easier to oppose something than it is to take something away 107 00:06:52,410 --> 00:06:55,070 after people already have it. MANU RAJU: That's right. JOHN HARWOOD: Thanks, Manu. 108 00:06:55,070 --> 00:06:58,350 Now, stay online all week long and check out the news you need to know on the Washington 109 00:06:58,350 --> 00:07:03,110 Week website. That's, of course, at PBS.org/WashingtonWeek. 110 00:07:03,110 --> 00:07:17,370 And that's all for this edition of the Washington Week Webcast Extra.